'Ain Ghazal Statues

The ʿAin Ghazal statues are large-scale lime plaster and reed statues discovered at the archaeological site of ʿAin Ghazal in Amman, Jordan, dating back to approximately 9,000 years ago (made between 7200 BC and 6250 BCE), from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic C period. A total of 15 statues and 15 busts were discovered in 1983 and 1985 in two underground caches, created about 200 years apart. The statues are among the earliest large-scale representations of the human form and represent remarkable specimens of prehistoric art from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B or C period. Their purpose remains uncertain, with archaeologists believing they may have been buried just after production, having possibly been made with that intent. The ʿAin Ghazal Statues are today part of the collections of The Jordan Museum in Amman, with some also on display at the Amman Citadel's Jordan Archaeological Museum, while a few have been loaned to foreign museums: one statue is in the Louvre Museum in Paris; parts of two other statues can be seen at the British Museum in London; and one of the figures with two heads is on show in the Louvre Abu Dhabi. The figures are of two types: full statues and busts. Some of the busts are two-headed. Great effort was put into modelling the heads, with wide-open eyes and bitumen-outlined irises. The statues represent men, women and children; women are recognizable by features resembling breasts and slightly enlarged bellies, but neither male nor female sexual characteristics are emphasized, and none of the statues have genitals; the only part of the statues fashioned with any amount of detail is the face. The statues were formed by modelling moist plaster from limestone on a reed core using plants that grew along the banks of the Zarqa River. The reed decayed over the millennia, leaving plaster shells with hollow interiors. Lime plaster is formed by heating limestone to temperatures between 600 and 900 °C (1, 100 and 1, 700 °F); hydrated lime is then combined with water to make a dough, which was then modelled. Plaster becomes a water-resistant material when it dries and hardens. Heads, torsos and legs were formed from separate bundles of reeds which were then

Data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).